


and i know no one will save me;

by Sparrows



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Awkwardness, F/M, Female Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Kissing, Viera Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), set between "breath of respite" and mt. gulg dungeon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-03
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-14 22:07:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29178453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sparrows/pseuds/Sparrows
Summary: "Is it not traditional, in most tales, for the hero to gift his fair maiden a kiss on the eve of battle, before he departs?"The Warrior of Light has a request she would make of the Crystal Exarch before braving the heights of Mt. Gulg.It is a request he should not,must notaccept - and yet, despite himself, he does.
Relationships: G'raha Tia | Crystal Exarch/Warrior of Light
Comments: 12
Kudos: 58





	and i know no one will save me;

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [Naut](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thepapernautilus) for giving this a polish before I posted it! I appreciate you very much ❤ If you haven't read her work, please do, she writes some phenomenal stuff!

The Talos is taking shape. Has already taken shape, actually; between the two of them, the Chais have proven most effective in making the best use of the workforce at their disposal. The main structure is complete, insofar as it can be – the Talos is a behemoth, a giant of unprecedented scale in any era before or after the Flood, and it has nowhere near the refinement of its smaller brothers. It has all the power a construct of its size could need. All that is needed now is to flip the switch, so to speak.

The sight of it rising from the horizon, a mountain even among mountains, makes the Exarch feel very small. He drums his crystalline fingers along his staff, lips pursed in deep thought. His earlier conversation with Kjelle— with the _Warrior of Darkness_ weighs heavy upon his heart. He is, frankly, amazed to have gotten away with it – with speaking so fondly, so yearningly, of the very woman who sat no more than a fulm or two away, with her none the wiser to being the very subject of discussion.

It shall be one of the memories he takes into the Void with him, when that hour comes. He has struggled to share in the anticipation and joy spreading like wildfire amongst those working on the Talos project; it _would_ be difficult, after all, to grow excited for one’s own demise.

He has been a dead man walking for a hundred years. A few bells longer is of little concern.

Off to the left, a quiet clearing of the throat drags him from his thoughts.

“Exarch? Do you have a moment?”

The Exarch has known Kjelle both in person and in parable and yet, as he turns to face her, he realises he has never known her to be _scared_. She stands more stiffly than usual, fidgets from one heel to the other, keeps her hands clasped below her navel as she runs one carefully-painted nail back-and-forth along the opposite knuckle.

He inclines his head and smiles reassuringly, though he is for once grateful that his cowl hides most of his face; it means she cannot see how the expression does not reach his eyes. “For you, my friend? Of course.”

“Good, good.” She steps closer, close enough that he could reach out and take her hand if he so wished – but he remains still. The everlasting Light spilling from overhead gilds her skin into the perfect bronze of a freshly-cast sculpture, though with her head angled downwards like this, most of her features are cast into shadow. “I... I have something to ask of you.” She swallows, purses plum-purple lips in though for a moment; he greedily tracks the motions with his eyes. “An indulgence, if you would.”

That sparks something in his memories of Norvrandt’s earliest days after his arrival. “We are all of us made sinners by the Flood,” he murmurs, more to himself than to her; “if the eaters will feast regardless, let us feed them well.” Religion had fallen out of favour among the common folk since the Flood, but some scraps of it had persisted to the present day as common Vrandtic sayings. Louder, he says, “And what _would_ you ask of me, then?”

And here he sees her glance away again. She looks down at her feet, the toe of one immaculately-white boot dragging a line through the packed dust and dirt, and then her gaze drifts skywards, to where the peak of Mt. Gulg hangs in the sky in an impossible, immovable orbit, like some strange mockery of a sun few in Norvrandt’s memory have glimpsed for themselves.

“I know your heart belongs to another,” she begins, hesitant when he has never heard her hesitate before today, wringing her fingers together tightly as if to keep them from trembling, “but— but I would like to be selfish, I think. Just once.”

 _You’re wrong,_ he wants to say, _what remains of this heart of mine is yours alone, and has always been_ – but he is a coward, and that cowardice seals the words away.

(It is easier to lose something, after all, if you are not aware it is being lost. If you believe it to have been lost long ago.)

“You are free to refuse,” Kjelle murmurs, “and if you do, then we need never speak of this moment again.”

 _We will not have the chance, should all go to plan._ The Exarch cants his head. “You still have not requested your boon,” he points out, a smile lifting the corner of his lips. He suspects he knows already what she wants – her wandering gaze has dropped to his mouth and settled there – but he would hear her speak the words, regardless. It is his own form of selfishness.

“Is it not traditional, in most tales,” she says with a smile of her own (if a weak and brittle one), “for the hero to gift his fair maiden a kiss on the eve of battle, before he departs?”

His breath catches.

 _Oh,_ he thinks. _I am no hero. A mere thief, no more and no less. The title of hero is yours to claim._

She must see him pause and take it for a refusal, for no sooner has his reeling mind caught up with her words – with her _request_ , so painfully polite in its wording, even as she sidesteps asking directly – than she is making frantic excuses to depart.

“Wait,” he says, cutting her off. “You— You would— You wish to _kiss me_?” Under the cowl, both eyebrows rise high in disbelief. It is one thing to suspect what she wants; it is another entirely to hear her speak the words out loud, turning speculation to truth. “I am an old man,” he protests, “one who has committed many sins against you and yours for the purposes of saving this world...”

_And who seeks to commit one more, the greatest of all._

“Be that as it may,” Kjelle says, lacing her fingers together and staring down at them, “it does not stop me from caring for you. As... as _more_ than a mere friend or ally might. I worry for you when we leave the Crystarium. I come straight to you when we return. Your _aether_...” She shrugs helplessly, a weak and desperate laugh bubbling free. “It was a foolish idea from the beginning, regardless. I— I cannot blame you for—”

“For what?” The Exarch steps closer, staff clinking against the ground. He sets it aside, leaning it against the nearby rock-face.

“For not feeling the same.” Her voice is a mere whisper, long, tufted ears pinned as low as he has ever seen them. “You made it plain on the cliffside: you loved someone, and you love her still, and I cannot— I should not— but I _want to_. It frightens me.” Her voice wavers dangerously towards the end.

“Then do it.” His mouth is dry, the words coming out in a rough burr. “I would not stop you.”

_Not when our desires are the same._

Her hand trembles where it cups his jaw, her fingertips gentle against his skin. The pad of her thumb traces the seam of crystal splitting open his cheek, and it takes almost every ilm of self-control the Exarch possesses not to lean into the touch – to maintain this flimsy facade, this fictitious fantasy of a lover long-lost. She makes no move to push back his hood, to reveal more than he is willing to give; she seems content simply to leave her hand where it lies.

For a moment, he wonders if her resolve will fail her. He wonders if his own will waver first.

Kjelle leans down and presses her lips to his.

The kiss is such a soft and chaste thing. Her lips are warm and soft against his, her breath somehow sweet in his mouth; though she had leaned down towards him, the Exarch finds himself stretching up to meet her all the same, desperate to prolong this brief contact, to draw out the seconds as long as they will last. It still does not feel like enough.

When at last she pulls away, she does so reluctantly. She withdraws no more than needed, their breath still mingling against each others’ lips, and for one moment – for two – for three – they are helpless to do anything other than to look at each other, vermilion gaze meeting violet.

Kjelle’s tongue skims her lower lip. It is the smallest, subtlest movement, but the Exarch’s eyes track it all the same. His heart races in its cage of crystal and bone, his lips parted, breathing heavily despite the innocence of the act. 

And then, just as he is about to speak, to shatter the fragile silence...

It is impossible to know which of them moves first. They reach for each other and collide once more, this time with _hunger_. A hunger for each other’s mouths – for the slide of heat, the bruising pressure, entrance sought and gained between ragged breaths – and for each other’s touch. She curls her fingers into the front of his robes and drags him with her, hauling him close; he stumbles, but regains his footing quickly enough to spin their positions so that she cages him against the nearest rock face, nearly knocking over his staff.

He remembers this. Remembers her leaning over him, blotting out the then-mortal light with her taller frame. Remembers feeling cold crystal at his back instead of Light-warmed rock. Remembers the way her hands had slid over his body, grasping, seeking, _wanting_ – and as she had done then, she does now, her palms curling beneath his thighs to hoist him up until his knees dig into her hips, holding himself there against her.

She kisses him desperately, like a woman left to drown at sea seeking air wherever she can find it. When she nips at his lower lip he realises he had almost forgotten – the memory sanded smooth by the years like a pebble caught by the tide – that she had _fangs_. He returns the kiss just as fervently, voice little more than a groan from low in his chest, rumbling on the very edge of a purr. He loops both hands behind her neck, crystalline fingers winding through her hair. His lungs demand air but his heart demands he remain where he is: at her mercy, eyelashes fluttering closed in the depths of his cowl, his body arching hopeless and helpless towards hers.

“ _Raha_ ,” she moans, still mostly pressed against his lips, the name passing from her mouth into his like a benediction—

It is as though a spell has been broken. Kjelle flinches, pulling away, and the Exarch’s eyes fly open just in time to see her expression morph into one of utter regret. Her grip on his thighs falters, and he stumbles back against the rock for fear his legs might not quite support him.

“I’m sorry,” she chokes out, lifting both hands over her mouth; the apologies continue to spill from her lips, repetitive gasps of _I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to_ —

Under her feet, the dry earth prickles with frost.

The Exarch raises a hand. “There is nothing to apologise for,” he says with a wry smile; his lips are sore and probably flushed red, and he can taste the slightest tang of copper where she’d nipped at him just a little too hard. He clears his throat. “I am hardly blameless. I _was_ kissing you _back_ , after all.”

Kjelle drops her gaze to the floor. “I— The name,” she tries, after a moment. “The _name_ — he was dear to me, yes, but so are _you_ , please believe me—”

Something in his chest twists painfully. He wants nothing more, in that moment, than to pull back the cowl, to reveal himself – to soothe her by telling her that G’raha Tia and the Crystal Exarch were one and the same, her heart not nearly so traitorous as she believed – but to do so now, with the culmination of a century-long plan so close at hand, would be the worst kind of foolishness.

“I believe you,” he echoes, instead. A smirk lifts the corner of his mouth. “We can call it a _slip of the tongue_ , if you’d like.”

Kjelle snorts, despite herself. “That’s certainly _one_ way to phrase it, I suppose,” she says, tone diplomatic even though her own lips curl up in amusement. All too quickly, though, the expression fades. She sighs. “I should... I should probably get back to the others,” she murmurs. “Can we talk, once this is done?”

The Exarch swallows. “Of course, my friend,” he says, and the lie comes easily to his tongue. He is used to the bitter taste of falsehood by now. “I will keep you no longer.”

He watches her retreating form until it is swallowed up by the distance, and returns his gaze to Mt. Gulg.

One last memory to take with him into the rift, then; it is far, far more than he deserves.

She always has been.


End file.
